Of Perfect Soldiers and Broken Pieces
by Goldenseal
Summary: Steve Rogers does not have PTSD. He doesn't think this odd until he moves in with his team and notices no one else made it from their battles completely intact.


Steve Rogers does not have PTSD. At first, he doesn't consider that strange. In his day, they didn't even fully understand the full effects of Post-Traumatic stress. He heard it called shell shock and occasionally Combat Stress Reaction by army doctors but not enough people really noticed enough to give a diagnosis and care.

Steve does not have frequent nightmares or panic attacks or violent flashbacks. He doesn't even know that maybe he should until he moves into Stark tower (later renamed Avengers tower) with Tony Stark and notices the change in the man when he's out of his suit and away from the battlefield. In the mornings, Steve wakes up early but sometimes Tony can beat him to the breakfast table, hands shaking slightly as he grips his coffee mug, eyes with dark circles underneath focusing intently on a Starkpad without acknowledging any team member who walks in. Tony sleeps irregularly, it's not unusual for an Avengers to find him sprawled across a couch or in his lab, twitching slightly as he mumbles in his dreams. Steve never forgets the moment he walked into Stark's lab and found Tony collapsed in the corner, eyes open but unseeing, trembling like he was having some sort of attack. Thankfully Bruce was there, crouched next to him without touching, and waved off the wide eyed Captain before he had the chance to say anything.

Natasha introduces him to Wikipedia and somehow, after searching up the end of WW2 and clicking on endless linked pages, he ends up looking at a page on Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Not everyone who served in the military ends up with PTSD and Steve knows truthfully he hadn't had much fighting time during the war. The unspoken leader of the Avengers is both the youngest and the oldest among them and, if they had actually thought about it, although he had fought in one of the worst wars in history, Steve was far from the most experienced of the team. But he had almost _died_ , he had crashed into the ocean and froze, not expecting to live. That should certainly be traumatic. But yet, Steve is not haunted by the memory of that plane or those waters.

Tony can't listen to thunderstorms, he retreats into his room or his lab and tells JARVIS to blast the most obnoxious music he can find until the storm succeeds. Bruce confesses to Steve that thunder claps remind Tony of explosions. Steve starts to wonder if maybe it is odd for him to be calm and unshaken by his past traumas.

Perhaps it's the super solider serum, Steve is still finding new things about himself all the time, he guesses Americas perfect solider was not supposed to be damaged. It fixed his colorblindness, his asthma and a dozen others things he didn't even realize were wrong. Maybe Steve was just lucky to win the war and come out unscathed, perhaps it's nothing but a statistical probability. But somehow watching Tony struggle to fully wake some mornings, knowing that Natasha can't listen to certain Russian ballet music, Clint will never go to the circus unless he's forced to and seeing how Bruce avoids upper Manhattan and Harlem with a passion, Steve begins to feel as if something is truly wrong with him because of the serum.

Somehow being undamaged or unhurt doesn't make Steve feel stronger or better than the rest of his team. It makes him feel less superior then ever and like an outsider looking in.

So Steve smiles and remains patient and tries to keep his little team of out-of-place soldiers and broken pieces together. Sometimes it's hard to act as if nothing is wrong. Something feels wrong _because_ nothing is wrong. He understands that they have bad moments, bad days, and even bad weeks. The serum can't take away slow mornings or spilled coffee or life being too little and too much.

Sam asks him if he would like to attend one of his VA meetings (gently and kindly as if just the thought of it could cause something inside of Steve to snap. He wants to tell him how that part of him isn't even there. There's no catalyst, nothing to trigger because something inside him broke long ago and not amount of therapy will ever be able to _fix_ him)

Steve does, in fact, go to the meetings. Because Sam is his friend. Because Steve has never been strong in that aspect, never courageous enough, never brave enough to face his friends. Because of this charade of his where he simply ignores the problem (or lack thereof) and hopes it goes away. He feels like he does not belong there, listening to these people's stories of pain that he does not share. Some parts he does understand. The loss, the detachment, the lack of understanding anymore. His mother's death used to haunt him, kept him up at night long after she was buried and the serum robbed him of that, of _her_. Steve sketches her picture over and over again, sketches all of their pictures, Peggy and Bucky and everyone he loved just the way he remembers them, so full of life. Sam's words sound comforting, they make sense, Steve knows they should help but there's just nothing there. Just an empty space where emotions used to be.

If Sam is disappointed in Steve's lack of participation he doesn't show it. He doesn't mention anything to him. Sam must have noticed his awkwardness, how out of place Steve was among these people who have really _truly_ suffered. Its Sam's job to help the broken people, to know who they are and how the suffer. He must have seen that wrongness in Steve. Steve is the perfect soldier, he came out of the battles unscathed in more ways than one. This should be a blessing. And yet…And yet…

He wished to be normal. He knows it's stupid and irrational and the very opposite of what he should be thinking. He should be grateful he doesn't share what his team has, their pain, their suffering. But it's a mutual pain, a level of understanding and comfort which he will never fully be immersed in. Steve wishes- _dear god he wishes-_ for the broken pieces and the jaded edges, wishes to not be so _goddamn perfect_ so maybe...Just maybe he could begin to feel a bit more human again.

 **Edit 3/27/16**


End file.
